The report examines recent wildfires in the United States, summarizing their frequency, trends, and costs. It documents the increase in large wildfires and shows their concentration in western states. Cost and budget issues linked to wildfires are also examined. The report recommends ways to reduce the frequency and costs of wildfires along with measures to enhance the resilience of local communities to wildfires. Also noted is a misalignment of incentives in current wildfire policy. Local governments make most of the decisions that influence the cost of wildfires, but the federal government incurs most of the costs for preventing and suppressing wildfires. [Note: contains copyrighted material].

The U.S. defense budget for 2014 is more than double that of Russia and China’s combined. Measuring naval strength is trickier as comparisons of hulls or personnel matter less than surveillance and sophisticated weaponry and vessels like ice-cutters. As climate change melts sea ice, countries eye the Arctic for natural resources and trade routes, reassessing naval positions. Journalist Humphrey Hawksley writes about the Ice Curtain between the United States and Russia, one of three symbolic frontiers of the Cold War with just 88 kilometers separating each mainland: “Russia is bolstering its military presence there while reminding that its maritime boundary with the United States remains in dispute. For its part, the United States has stayed quiet.” The border between two rivals is described as non-hostile. Alaskans and Russians struggle with budgets too dependent on oil, yet are hopeful that melting sea ice means more development, infrastructure and trade for their remote settings. [Note: contains copyrighted material].

Protecting tropical forests is good for the global climate and good for development in forested countries. In the absence of robust carbon markets, performance-based funding to reduce emissions from deforestation is a key way donors can provide the incentives and commitment tropical countries need to curtail forest loss. Tropical forests are undervalued assets in the race to avert catastrophic climate change. They deliver a global, and very public, benefit by capturing and storing atmospheric carbon. [Note: contains copyrighted material].

An area of tropical forest the size of India will be deforested in the next 35 years, burning through more than one-sixth of the remaining carbon that can be emitted if global warming is to be kept below 2 degrees Celsius, the “planetary carbon budget”, but many of these emissions could be cheaply avoided by putting a price on carbon, according to the authors. [Note: contains copyrighted material].

President Richard Nixon’s 1973 request that Congress reform federal mining policy—though still unheeded—affirmed a powerful principle that guides U.S. natural resource policy: America’s public lands and waters, and the energy and minerals beneath them, belong to all Americans. It follows that, as owners of these resources, American taxpayers should be entitled to their fair share of the revenues from drilling, mining, logging, and other development that takes place on public lands. In practice, however, the outdated laws and regulations governing energy and natural resource extraction on U.S. public lands provide few protections for the fiscal interests of U.S. taxpayers. [Note: contains copyrighted material].

The technical note looks at the carbon emissions resulting from deforestation for a specific cacao plantation in Peru and the potential carbon footprint of chocolate sourced from that area. [Note: contains copyrighted material].

Consumers are delighted by low oil prices and economists anticipate increased global growth. But the low prices are locking many industries into infrastructure that relies on fossil fuels. “High-carbon infrastructure – power plants, pipelines, factories, inefficient buildings, roads and transport vehicles – built now will last and pollute for decades to come,” writes Deepak Gopinath. The low prices suppress demand for new technologies based on alternative fuels. Developing nations account for most global population growth in the energy sector. Delays in developing alternative energies lock countries like China and India into competitive patterns that encourage dependence on fossil fuels. In addition to ending subsidies for fossil fuels, Gopinath encourages taxes on consumption to reduce use and develop funding for alternative energies. [Note: contains copyrighted material].